Prior U.S. Pat. No. 6,415,590 assigned to the assignee of the present invention discloses and claims a harvester that is capable of making double windrows. Crop materials are severed from the ground as the harvester makes a first pass, and a stream of the severed materials is projected rearwardly from the harvesting header onto a cross-conveyor that moves the intercepted materials laterally of the machine and deposits them back onto the ground generally alongside the edge of the standing material that remains in the field. Then, on the next pass in the opposite direction, the harvester uses the cross-conveyor to lay down a second deposit of severed materials alongside or in association with the first deposit of materials. This produces a collection of merged, side-by-side, or at least relatively closely associated windrows that permits a high capacity machine such as a big square baler or a forage harvester to ingest twice the volume of crop materials during each of its passes through the field than would otherwise be true, leading to higher operating efficiencies.
Some machines have such large capacity that it would be desirable to provide triple windrows. Accordingly, one important object of the present invention is to provide a harvesting method and apparatus in which triple windrows can be formed on-the-go by the same machine that severs the standing crop from the field. In other words, it is an important goal of the present invention to eliminate the need for subsequent raking or merging equipment and to provide the mowing or crop severing functions and the triple windrow-making functions all in the same machine. Preferably, a conditioning function is also carried out by the machine.
This objective is obtained in the present invention using a harvester having a cross-conveyor that is capable of intercepting the stream of severed materials from the header of the machine, conveying such materials laterally, and projecting them a substantial distance laterally into a mowed strip from a previous pass through the field. The cross-conveyor is readily raisable and lowerable between operating and standby locations from the tractor seat to permit severed materials to either land on the conveyor or pass beneath it, as determined by the operator during each pass.
During a first pass in the procedure, the operator positions the machine at a distance inwardly from the uncut edge of the standing crop materials, such distance preferably being approximately the same as or slightly less than the width of cut normally taken by the header. As the first pass is made, the cross-conveyor is maintained in its raised position so that severed crop materials issuing from the header are projected rearwardly therefrom in a stream that passes beneath the raised cross-conveyor and drops to the ground within the mowed strip immediately behind the advancing header. This produces a first deposit of severed crop materials within the mowed strip and leaves an unmowed band of standing crop materials along one side of the mowed strip. A normally larger body of standing materials remains along the other side of the mowed strip.
When the operator completes the first pass, he turns the machine around at the end of the field, lowers the cross-conveyor, and commences a second pass in the opposite direction through either the band of standing materials or the larger body of standing materials, depending upon whether the cross-conveyor is arranged to discharge to the right or to the left. Thus, as the second pass is carried out, the severed materials issuing from the header are intercepted by the cross-conveyor, are moved laterally to the outer extremity of the machine, and are projected into the mowed strip from the first pass to associate with the first deposit of severed materials. Thus, when the second pass has been completed, the mowed strip from the first pass contains two ribbon-like deposits of severed crop materials.
After completing the second pass, the operator again turns the machine around and commences a third pass in the original direction through either the band of standing materials or the main body of standing materials, again depending upon whether the cross-conveyor has been configured for right-hand or left-hand discharge. During the third pass the cross-conveyer again functions to intercept the severed materials from the header, deliver them laterally outwardly, and project them through the air a sufficient distance that they fall to the ground in relatively close association with the already existing first and second deposits within the first mowed strip. Consequently, when the third pass is completed, the mowed strip from the first pass contains three deposits of severed materials.
In one form of the invention, a double-windrowing cross-conveyor of the type disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,415,590 may be modified to adapt it for triple windrowing. The conveyor as disclosed in the '590 patent includes a conveying surface presented by an endless draper belt that terminates just inboard of the adjacent drive wheel of the tractor of the harvester. In order to adapt this conveyor to project materials further outwardly in accordance with triple windrowing concepts, an extension or supplemental conveyor may be added on to the discharge end of the existing conveyor so that the discharge end of the extension conveyor approximately coincides with the corresponding drive wheel on the tractor but, in any event, is long enough to project the materials outwardly beyond the drive wheel further than previously possible with the double windrowing conveyor. It has been found desirable to run the extension conveyor at a faster speed than the main conveyor so that the crop materials are accelerated as they are projected outwardly by the extension conveyor. Moreover, it has been found beneficial to cock the extension conveyor somewhat upwardly at an angle to the main conveyor so as to increase the loft and raise the trajectory of the crops as they travel away from the harvester.
In one preferred form of the invention, the extension conveyor takes the form of a series of driven rollers extending transversely of the path of travel of the materials on the conveyor, such rollers having full length, metal paddles about their periphery to aggressively engage and propel the severed materials along their way. By driving the rollers through a hydraulic motor separate from the drive associated with the main conveyor, the extension conveyor can be fairly easily mounted on and removed from the main conveyor for changing between triple windrowing and double windrowing operations as may be necessary or desirable.